Cavs meet their match at West Linn

Anderegg and Jett are tough for Clackamas

The Clackamas Cavaliers, with eight underclassmen and two holes in their varsity lineup, found themselves no match for state powerhouse West Linn in a Jan. 30 Three Rivers League dual wrestling meet at West Linn.

The Lions, who proved themselves one of the states top dual-meet teams at the recent Oregon Wrestling Classic, won nine of the 14 matches en route to a 45-24 team victory, four by fall, three by decision and two by forfeit.

Anderegg and Bagley entered the meet ranked first and sixth respectively in the state.

Eaton was ranked the fourth-best heavyweight in the state, while Jett was pretty much unheralded. Eatons overtime win over Jett upped his record to 23-1 on the 2013-14 season.

Clackamas junior co-captain Kyle Anderegg had plenty to say about the meet, his match, and Jetts match with Eaton.

West Linns a great team, Eaton said. They showed us what we need to work on to get better for regionals and state. We need to wrestle better on the bottom....

Anderegg added, I still believe we can do well at regionals and take a lot of kids to state. Were a much better team than we were a year ago.... Well have a lot of kids coming back next year, and were just going to keep getting better and better.

Andereggs match with Bagley was extremely physical. Anderegg was outweighed by the Lion 220-pounder, but he kept his focus and was in control all the way.

Anderegg scored a takedown at the end of the first round for a 2-0 advantage. Bagley got two escapes in the second round, while Anderegg increased his lead to 5-2, earning points for a takedown and when Bagley was dinged a point for unnecessary roughness.

Anderegg escaped near the midpoint of the third round, and increased his lead to 7-2 with 47 seconds remaining when Bagley was dinged a second time for unnecessary roughness.

And with 31 seconds to go, the official disqualified Bagley for unnecessary roughness.

Im not sure what his problem was, said Anderegg. Its the first time weve wrestled.... I was going to win on points anyway.... He can head-butt and punch me all he wants. Ill just wrestle.

Anderegg, who plays defensive end and outside linebacker in football, says he has found himself opposite Bagley on the gridiron many times over the years. Clackamas hammered West Linn 40-7 last fall in football.

Anderegg said it is unlikely that he and Bagley will meet again, because he hopes to drop down to 195 by regionals.

I feel like Im out of my weight class at 220, he said. Everyones a lot bigger than me and when a shoot, I have a hard time taking them down. I hope to get down to 195 by regionals, or maybe next week.

With last weeks win over Bagley, Anderegg improved his record to 24-5 on the 2013-14 season.

There was no fear factor for Jett in his match with Eaton. The two wrestlers grappled to a scoreless draw in the first round. Eaton escaped early in the second round; Jett escaped nine seconds into the third round, and regulation ended in a 1-1 tie.

Eaton scored a takedown 27 seconds into the overtime for the only offensive points of the match, and the 3-1 win.

Ellis is an amazing athlete, said Anderegg. Hes going to play Division I football and hes a Division I wrestler. He weights 270; Zach Jett weighs 230. But Zach is too strong-willed to back down. He just went out there and wrestled hard.... Ive wrestled and played football with Zach since third grade and its been fun watching him grow. Im beyond impressed [with Zachs performance]. Ellis is huge; Ellis would have killed me if Id wrestled heavyweight.

Miller was impressive in his overtime win over Handris. He trailed the entire match until he reversed Handris to tie things up at 3-3 35 seconds into the third round.

Miller scored a takedown 39 seconds into the extra period for his 5-3 win.

Pfeifer appeared on a mission in his match with Ellingson. He was leading 11-0 with 30 seconds remaining in the match, when he earned his fall. Pfeifer improved his season record to 27-7 with the win. It was his 13th fall of the season.

Nguyen was clearly the better wrestler at 126. Donovan scored his only point midway through the third round when Nguyen sprung him in an effort to attempt a major decision. Nguyen improved his record to 22-5.

Junior team co-captain Tim Harman continued impressive for West Linn, upping his season record to 25-0 with a third-round fall over Clackamas senior Tristan Prow. Harman was leading 16-3 at the time of the fall.

With the dual win, West Linn improved to 3-0 in the Three Rivers League, while Clackamas slipped to 2-2 with the loss.

The Lions wrestle at Lake Oswego (1-3) tonight, and they finish up the season on Tuesday, Feb. 11, when they do battle with Canby (3-0) for the TRL dual-meet crown.

Canby hosts Clackamas tonight in the Cavaliers final meet of the 2014 league dual season.

Harman said of the upcoming anticipated dual-meet showdown with the Cougars: If we come out mentally ready, I think it will be a bad night for Canby. Canbys tough, but we wrestled them at the Classic and got them pretty good. Im confident we can beat them, but weve got to come out hard.